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How Reliable Are University Rankings?

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Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#71

Post by akjssdk »

roel_v wrote: post #70
akjssdk wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a Dutch PhD student, I am not sure I agree. There is some hype around the rankings of the universities and specifically the bachelor and master tracks at a given university, but not many students really care about them. I certainly did not choose my university based on their ranking, and don't know many that did. Choice is based much more on travel distance and other factors, not on perceived quality of a universi…

Also, I think as a student you're quite shielded from it. Ask your professor (not the postdocs or the assocs, the real ones) some day, I'm sure they have an opinion on it.

Yes for sure, in academia the perceived ranking is quite important. But, at least in my field, ranking is decoupled from the ranking of a university and is more on a department basis. I.e., the physics department of a specific university might be well regarded internationally, even though the university itself not so much. This is of course helped by the fact that Dutch universities are all quite highly ranked.

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#72

Post by arethuza »

barry-cotter wrote: post #21
spideymans wrote: post #4

Why is there such a fixation on university rankings in the United States? Postsecondary rankings don't seem to matter as much in other Western countries.

Not true of the UK, France, Korea or Japan. I don’t know if they care about what are basically league tables but any educated citizen would find it no more difficult to reel off five to ten of their best universities than an American would to list Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, MIT etc. I can see how it would look weird from a German, or possibly a Dutch or Nordic perspective but a deliberate effort to bring up…

I think in the UK it is easy - both universities are ranked as excellent!

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#73

Post by arethuza »

spideymans wrote: post #62
Prcmaker wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Australia here. Universities consistently market their national ranking here. As a staff member I've found management consistently pushes things that will raise their ranking. As a student initially at a high ranked university, I found I got a better education by switching to a much lower ranked university.

> As a student initially at a high ranked university, I found I got a better education by switching to a much lower ranked university. That’s interesting. I’ve consistently heard the same sentiment from ex-students and alumni of certain highly ranked Canadian universities (undergrad) as well. They’ll generally complain about a lack of student support and restrictive policies at these institutions, making it needlessl…

My wife did a law degree at a very highly ranked university in the UK after doing a business degree at a comparatively lowly ranked institution (although still very well regarded) - coincidentally the latter being where I did a CS degree and thought the teaching was excellent.

She said the quality of teaching at the higher ranked university was almost comically bad compared to the lower ranked university.

The usual justification I have read for these things is that the top universities have already selected the best candidates, so they don't actually need too much teaching. Which seems to be missing the point.....

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#74

Post by notechback »

University rankings have two key issues:

1. They are significantly biased to English language (universities/research output) and bigger countries in general 2. They are totally irrelevant from the student perspective as they mostly focus on research output, which means that you'll get the richest universities and the best professors will be writing papers rather than teaching bachelor level courses.

There are some attempts to fix these issues (see eg the EU "Multirank" which allows you to choose your priorities), but it's still hit and miss.

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#75

Post by AtlasBarfed »

plorkyeran wrote: post #45
AtlasBarfed wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you dropped 200k-300k on an education, you'll be invested in either the continued value or and improvement in your investment's reputation, which as the years go on is really its only value.

200k is about what I spent on my education and I can't say I've really had any reason to care about my school's reputation past my first job after graduation.

Tech jobs generally don't care, but traditional management and those tracks really care about that.

Because getting a job in those areas is about abstract abilities that can't be (somewhat) measured with code tests, technology signifiers, and tricky questions like tech interviews.

So a certain school is a "class entry cue" for such tracks.

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#76

Post by kop316 »

qzw wrote: post #51
jedberg wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's very similar to sports teams. The tops teams don't vary all that much from year to year. They might change positions a bit, but it's rare for a new team to show up who hasn't shown up before. They essentially have to get lucky and get someone who is super talented into a long term contract, who then attracts additional talent. Or they have to invent a whole new way of doing things, like how the Oakland A's inven…

I would add that the effect is even more pronounced in college sports (in the US) compared to pro sports, especially those that have a draft system (so the NBA but not Formula 1, e.g.). The persistent institutional/reputational advantages enjoyed by some of the top college sports programs really are perfect illustrations of the network effects you mentioned. I mean, just look at the rankings enjoyed by Notre Dame in…

You are describing exactly why I long stopped watching college sports.

The ranking system for teams is opaque, and I think it is intentionally so to keep the "top teams" top, and all others down. There are plenty of instances where a "lower" ranked team in football have an undefeated season, but have no chance to go the "playoffs" or even play in a more prestigeous bowl game. This is on top of other teams NOT having an undefeated season, but still get the playoffs or a better bowl game.

Try to actually bring that up and all you get back is "well you must have come from a college with a bad sports team".

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#77

Post by sytelus »

qzw wrote: post #9

From the abstract: *>we both formally and experimentally show in multiple ways that this ranking scheme is not reliable and cannot be trusted as authoritative because it is too sensitive to weight changes and can easily be gamed. That's a feature, not a bug, as far as USNWR (the magazine doing the ranking) is concerned. A more reliable ranking would be more stable and therefore less interesting for the universities.…

Rankings are irrelevant for top 20 but for the rest it matters a lot. Vast majority of population ends up somewhere outside of top 20. They have to chose between A, B and C and rankings plays its part. Reliable ranking is important because it rewards universities with better enrollment (and vice versa).

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#78

Post by commandlinefan »

plorkyeran wrote: post #19
spideymans wrote: post #4

Why is there such a fixation on university rankings in the United States? Postsecondary rankings don't seem to matter as much in other Western countries.

Is there actually a big fixation on university rankings? I had no idea what my school's ranking was (apparently it's now #40) and I'm not sure I've ever had conversation where university rankings came up outside of specifically talking about where a high school student is thinking about applying. Even then it's not like it's common for people to pick which school to go to out of the ones that accepted them based sole…

> Is there actually a big fixation on university rankings?

I've observed that, among people who care about university rankings in hiring, there are exactly two categories: the top five, and everything else. If you went to #200, you're the "same" as somebody who went to #25.

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#79

Post by jseliger »

notechback wrote: post #74

University rankings have two key issues: 1. They are significantly biased to English language (universities/research output) and bigger countries in general 2. They are totally irrelevant from the student perspective as they mostly focus on research output, which means that you'll get the richest universities and the best professors will be writing papers rather than teaching bachelor level courses. There are some at…

Those are useful issues, to be sure, but there is a lot more incoherence than those two: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2011/02/14/the-order-of-t...

Re: How Reliable Are University Rankings?

#80

Post by jdmg94 »

I personally think Universities and colleges are a scam that was necessary before we had access to the bulk of human knowledge on the tip of our fingers. We should go back to an apprentice system, go through elementary and middle school and then find a profession you would want to learn OTJ, this would shift the responsibility of training to companies but the people coming out of there would be immediately productive.
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